


Drumming Song

by Kingmaking



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M, Red Wedding, i... love them
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-22
Updated: 2019-02-22
Packaged: 2019-11-04 00:23:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17887982
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kingmaking/pseuds/Kingmaking
Summary: "Now, sister, you keep your husband busy and happy. Make a fine new son for House Tully and I promise to make sure you won’t be disturbed." Lothar smiled, almost reassuring. "Not a soul to hear."Roslin observes her new husband at her wedding.





	Drumming Song

**Author's Note:**

> Formerly part of a multi-chaptered work, I since deleted it and decided to make everything standalone.  
> Consistency??? Not in my house.

_A bear, there was, a bear, a bear!_

When she meant to find something her new Lord husband might have in common with her, Roslin’s mind filled with tales of Lady Minisa Tully, dead in childbirth before her son had turned four. Then, she attempted to bring to life the non-existent memory she kept of her own lady Mother, Bethany of House Rosby, who’d lived for a month and two days after Roslin’s birth, childbed fever melting the flesh from her bones until she was pale and thin, then dead. That was hardly something one might want to bring up at one’s wedding feast.

Aside from a dead mother… Edmure came from a tightly-knit family, the proud Tullys of Riverrun, while Roslin came from… This. She was but one Frey among near a hundred children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren of her lord Father. At least Lord Walder remembered who Roslin was -- most of the time. And Edmure’s childhood must’ve been so lonely, with his sisters older by nigh a decade and no cousins to play with; Roslin didn’t envy him, not as she watched her family drink and merrymake with the loud Northerners, shouting _The King in the North!_ with every new song.

Once or twice, when she thought he wasn’t looking, Roslin had chanced a glance at Edmure, sitting to her left. He was handsome; more handsome than King Robb, she’d decided, with his trimmed beard and that confident set in his jaw, a man grown where the King was only a boy, a young wolf.

"What is my lady thinking about?" Edmure asked, taking her little hand in his big one.

Roslin nearly gasped; she’d been lost in thought, recalling the feeling of that beard of his on her skin when they’d kissed, chastly, at the end of the ceremony. "I hope the feast is to your liking, my lady. I know it’s a bit rushed, but I promise to hold the grandest feast, once the war’s been won and we’ve returned to Riverrun. Just for you."

"I would like that very much, my lord." And once they were back in Riverrun, maybe they would start using each other’s name. Roslin was surprised by how much she wanted this; love, warmth and peace.

Edmure was silent for a moment, then: "I hope you’ve forgiven my nephew for denying you the crown he'd promised you. I vow to be a worthy husband, though I am but a lord."

 _It wasn’t_ me _he’d promised to marry_ , Roslin meant to say, but the result had been the same. She remembered the screaming and swearing, the day her lord Father and brothers had found out about the Westerling girl, how she’d cuddled up in bed with her younger sisters, hiding under pillows and furs until the storm had passed.

Everything and everyone had been silent for days, then, until Roslin’s lord Father had summoned her to his solar and declared she was to be wed to a Tully instead, the Lord Paramount. She’d been weaned on tales of Tully _arrogance_ , how they’d never sent a son or daughter up from Riverrun to marry a Frey; she’d expected her father to look somehow pleased with himself, but Lord Walder hadn’t.

He did now, though, drinking his tea and eating melted cheese, sending wine jug upon wine jug for the Northerners. Roslin herself may have indulged a little bit in spiced Arbor red, but only because Fair and Fat Walda both had told her it’d make the bedding more comfortable for her, the cousins finally in agreement over something. Edmure’s smiles had melted her worry away, though. Nothing very bad could happen to her in her childhood bed, not with such a brave knight for a husband, not with a whole army of brothers and nephews standing guard. What she _did_ fear was the bedding ceremony itself, getting picked up and stripped of her pretty wedding gown. She wanted to be seen naked by her lord and her lord only, not by drunk men emboldened by wine and song.

 _It’s just one night_. After it, she’d go to Riverrun, hopefully pregnant, to prepare the castle for when the war had been won and Edmure came home to her. She’d meet his uncle, the knight of legend; she’d meet the King’s wife, the Westerling girl. A Queen, now. They’d be close as sisters, Roslin had decided, sewing and singing together, bringing up children with Tully-red hair.

The wine made her feel warm and fuzzy, daring like her brothers, who fought in a war alongside the Young Wolf. She told Edmure what he wanted to hear, but it was her young heart’s truth: "You delight me, my lord. And, I must be honest, I never had much of a liking for cold weather."

"Then I promise to keep you warm, my lady." He planted kisses along her knuckles, strangely hot. She wanted him to do the same to her mouth, her cheek, her neck, but only after they’d been left alone. "I fear I’ve made you blush, my lady. It wasn’t my intent."

 _Blush?!_ Only a little girl could blush, not a woman grown, wedded and soon bedded. Roslin willed her composure back, with little effect. "It’s but the wine, my lord. Arbor red is stronger than I remembered." And the music was so _loud_ … _Boom boom boom_ , over and over. As the new Lady Paramount, was she allowed to order them to tone it down? Probably not. Everyone was so happy, singing along to… Something. Roslin couldn’t make it out; the Northerners were singing -- whistling, mostly -- one tune and her kin another.

They were sending the younger ones to bed, one after the other; Roslin had a good enough idea of what that meant. At her side, Edmure laced his fingers with hers. Roslin turned and found him looking at her, love -- or something like it -- in the eyes. "I’ve been thinking, my rose." Roslin’s heart soared. "When you leave for Riverrun, you should pick a few of your cousins… nephews? The sons and daughters of your brothers. Riverrun has been empty of children for so long already. We could foster them at the castle, keep them at your side."

Most of her brothers’s sons and grandsons were terrible -- not that she would say that aloud --, but the daughters were lovely, for the most part, shy and sweet the way Roslin had been. Maybe she could even bring Fair Walda with her, find her a husband from among Edmure’s bannermen. She was so beautiful… if not kind, someone was bound to ask for her pretty hand.

And there were so many others! "My sisters Arwyn and Shirei are dear to my heart, always have been. I should like to keep them close to me." They had no mother, just like her; they were lost in the angry sea of Lord Walder’s children, just like her. Yes, she’d bring them, have them know some peace, a big castle just for them.

"Then if you desire it, my lady, I vow to make it happen." He kissed her knuckles; Roslin wished he’d kissed her mouth, but there’d be plenty of time for that -- sooner rather than later, if the banging of wine horns on tables was any indicator. The singing had stopped, replaced with shouting: _Bed them! Bed them! Bed them!_ Edmure’s hand tightened around hers. "Fear not, my lady. Your brother promised me they’d bring us to our room and then go back to merrymaking."

 _Which brother?_ Roslin meant to ask, but she also thought: _This is_ my _room, not yours_. The room she’d once shared with her sister Arwyn, but now the poor thing had been sent to bunk with Serra and Sarra, her brother Raymund’s twins. Roslin wouldn’t even get to have a bed of her own for a night, though, sister replaced with husband. She doubted Edmure would giggle late into the night and share wild tales the way Arwyn did, though. They'd make new tales.

At Roslin’s side, her lord Father called for silence, then announced the end of the feast proper and the beginning of the bedding ceremony. _I don’t want this_ , Roslin meant to say, just as tears filled her eyes. It would be _so bad_ , she knew, as over a dozen of her relatives made up for the lord’s table, swooping down upon them. She felt him give her trembling hand one last squeeze, saw the sympathetic look he shot her -- it wouldn’t be half as bad for him, Roslin knew -- and then he was gone, dragged away by Fair Walda and her group.

Actually, Fair Walda could stay here and grow old for what little Roslin cared.

 _I won’t cry_ , she commanded of herself, just as tears streamed down her face anyway, a girl’s tears on the day -- night -- she was to become a woman. She didn’t fear the actual bedding, only despised the whole… debauchery of getting there. She felt her feet leave the ground as they lifted her up, so high above the others that she could spot the King and his mother in the distance, solemn Lady Stark. The woman’s eyes were on Roslin’s face, on her tears. She’d have to reassure Edmure, later, promise she wasn’t crying from the fear of what he’d do to her, in that bed.

Before they’d made it up the six floors to her bedchamber, Roslin had been stripped of both her shoes, her pretty Tully bridal cloak of red and blue, her shawl and the pins that kept her tresses of brown hair together. Her brothers and nephews were positively ripping her wedding gown apart when, from the back of the group, came the composed voice of Lothar the Lame: "That’s enough." _So you were the one who promised to keep me safe_.

There were some whispers of protest, but nobody at the castles much liked -- or dared, for that matter -- to anger Lothar, twelfth-born son of Lord Walder or not. He sent the others back down with a wave of his gloved hand; it did not occur to Roslin to ask her brother why he’d decided to wear gloves of leather at her wedding feast. Once they were properly alone in the corridor, standing in front of the door to Roslin’s bedchamber, Lothar placed a hand on her shoulder, the one that hadn’t been stripped naked.

"Now, sister, you keep your husband busy and happy. Make a fine new son for House Tully and I promise to make sure you won’t be disturbed." Lothar smiled, almost reassuring. "Not a soul to hear."

Roslin nodded, although there wasn’t really anything in that promise for her to approve or disapprove of. Her brother ushered her into the room, gloved fingers barely touching her naked back, until she was left alone with Edmure. _He_ for one was as naked as the day he’d come into the world, sitting at the edge of her childhood bed with a cup of wine. He smiled, that warm smile that made Roslin melt, and she knew nothing bad would ever happen to her, not with him at her side.

"Come sit with me, my rose." She felt… happy. Yes, that was the word; happy, even if her lord Father had raged and raged at the Young Wolf and his _whore of Westerling_ , as he’d called her. But the King was kind and, Roslin decided, so must be the woman he’d fallen in love with. They’d meet soon and be like a family, the Queen in the North and the Lady Tully.

Roslin heard the lock turn, then only silence.

And not a soul to hear.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading!


End file.
